Field
Embodiments of the present invention generally relate to improving operation of a contact center, and, in particular, to a system and method for improved time of assigning work by accounting for communication system latency.
Description of Related Art
For conventional contact center systems, status of system resources (e.g., the agents) is monitored in order to use the monitored status for assignment decisions by the contact center routing engine. Assignment decisions would include assigning specific customer contacts or other pieces of work to specific agents. Conventionally, system resources are located relatively close to the routing engine, either in a physical sense or a communication delay sense. Therefore, conventional systems assume that the routing engine is acting upon information that is correct at the instant of action. Conventional systems do not recognize that such a delay exists, or assume that if such a delay exists that it is not a significant delay. Such an assumption becomes less valid as the delay between monitoring and acting increases, leading to uncertainty and incorrectness in routing decisions.
Therefore, what is needed is a contact center routing engine that takes into account delays between monitoring the status of system resources and the usage of the status by the routing engine.
Therefore, a need exists to provide improved self-service operation of a contact center, and, in particular, to a system and method to account for communication system latency, in order to provide improved customer satisfaction, and ultimately higher sales and lower operational cost.